When I decided to eat all the edible parts of the cow, I really didn’t think it would be that hard.
I am a big eater and like almost everything. I can count on one hand the foods I dislike. I assumed with the cow eating there would be parts that sounded gross and things I would not love. I had no idea there would be parts that I honestly couldn’t swallow. That is, until I tried chinchulines.
The day started well enough. We were in a part of town called La Boca, the birthplace of tango. To escape the hordes of tourists, restaurant owners shoving menus in our faces and non-stop music from the street, we ducked into a little restaurant/parilla.
Charming is the only way to describe it. Brightly painted walls, an attentive, quirky waiter, and big glasses of red wine.
We were the only people in the restaurant which meant fabulous service. The waiter showed us each bottle of wine, explained the cuts of meat, and told us about different parts of Argentina.
You could even go in the back and check out the meat on the BBQ.
When I asked the waiter what chinchulines were, he vaguely pointed to his stomach region and then assured me they were really good. So I ordered them. I mean, they are on the menu! How bad can they be if people actually order them?
And once I tasted chinchulines, I knew it would be harder than I thought. The only way these things can be on a menu is because they have them left over and assume dumb tourists who don’t speak Spanish will order them because they don’t know better. No one, and I mean NO ONE can actually like these things. They are stringy and chewy on the outside, squishy and repulsive on the inside.
Before we left for Argentina, my friends Nancy and Roberta both suggested I eat all the Kosher parts of the cow (the front half). I so wished I had listened to them. It is going to take a lot of dulce de leche to get me to forget chinchulines.
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